Research

Seeing administration as “the art of ‘getting things done’” (Herbert Simon, “Administrative Behavior”, 1957) means to emphasize the process of decision making and ‘doing’ in public administration research. The micro-foundations of the individual public servant’s behavior, therefore, are key aspects in explaining how public service is provided. At the core of my research stand the behavioral implications of motivational dispositions among public employees and their relations to the institutional environment. I prefer using experimental methods, like laboratory or conjoint experiments. They allow to overcome limitations of methods using observational data, like selection bias, and due to randomization they also allow for causal interpretations.